Say Yes to YaS!

"This is your life, this is your ride!,” YaS (yoga and spinning) instructor Ashley Patton shouts as Mumford & Sons blares over speakers. In a jam-packed room lit only by daylight in Venice Beach, several dozen sweat-drenched spinners embark on the most challenging four minutes of class: the daunting “hill.”

For those who find it hard to subscribe to overly inspirational fitness classes, the work-hard, feel-good YaS might be their exception to the rule. Founded by Kimberly Fowler(the godmother of Hybrid) in 2001, YaS studios offer spinning and yoga classes, and the class that made them famous: a hybrid combo of the two, comprising a half-hour of spinning followed by a half-hour of yoga.

A class during the spinning section of YaS.

“It’s the cardio training gained from intense indoor cycling paired with the strength and flexibility work of Yoga for Athletes,” says Fowler.

YaS started out of Fowler’s personal fitness frustration—Why hasn’t anyone combined yoga and spinning, she pondered, as she found herself running from yoga to indoor-cycling classes. So YaS was born. Today, she owns and operates a $10 million business that includes four studios in greater L.A. and Costa Mesa, a clothing line, several DVD's, a book, and celebrity clientele to boot (Julia Roberts, Rosario Dawson, and Whitney Port are fans, to name a few).

“It’s the first workout I’ve ever tried that I feel motivated to push myself, because of the environment that has been created,” says Port. “You feel alive, instead of counting the minutes until it’s over.”

In an exercise-obsessed city such as Los Angeles, it’s hard not to get lost in the muddle of dozens of exercise fads that are constantly popping up. “I know fitness is very trendy, but there’s something to be said for a workout program that has lasted over a decade and is still going strong,” says Fowler.

And this 54-year-old (who still wears skinny jeans, by the way) shows no signs of slowing down: “I get daily e-mails from people asking me to open all over the country. I wish I could click my ruby slippers and find perfect YaS locations.” On behalf of her New York fan contingency … we wait with bated breath.